The Gilded Age

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The Gilded Age
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Gilded Age

• Name of era comes from Mark Twain
• society economy appear strong
• government is weak and corrupt
• things were NOT as promising as they appeared

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Gilded Age
The Presidents
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President Rutherford B. Hayes

• Elected 1872, received Demo. votes in exchange
  for ending Reconstruction.
• Stolen Election
• Does not use spoils system angers party

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James Garfield

• Republican Half breed
• Chester A. Arthur was his VP
• July 2,1881 Garfield shot by Charles Guiteau
• Garfield dies from wounds
• Guiteau hung, thought to be insane

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Chester A. Arthur

• Reformed civil service with the Pendleton Act
• Created a merit system
• commission gave exams for all seeking govt. jobs

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Chester A. Arthur

• Reformed civil service with the Pendleton Act
• Created a merit system
• commission gave exams for all seeking govt. jobs

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Political Machines

• Machines controlled local politics in cities
• Helped immigrants for votes
• William Boss Tweed of NYC most famous for his
  Tammany Hall
• Cost NYC around 100 mill.
• Brought down by newspaper cartoonist, Thomas Nast

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Immigrants

• Importance of immigrants
• Easily accessible/lots of them(votes)
• Needed jobs, services, housing
• Were loyal to the machines

• Corruption
• Immigrants were hired to vote early and often
• Bosses took bribes, kickbacks, and payoffs.

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Thomas Nast

• Drew the political cartoon that introduced the
  donkey as Democrat and elephant as Republican.

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Grover Cleveland

• Democratic reformer, helped put down Tweed ring
• Reps. split over nominee
• Cleveland wins NY election

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Cleveland Reforms

• Presidential Succession Act 1886 listed order of
  who would succeed fallen pres. and vice president
• Interstate Commerce Act 1887 rail rate should be
  reasonable and just

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Interstate Commerce Act

• Passed in 1887 due to public outrage of Supreme
  Court support of railroads
• Gave government right to monitor rail traffic and
  freight rates
• Interstate Commerce Commission created to enforce
  law
• Had little affect until the early 1900s

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Benjamin Harrison

• Election of 1888 D. Cleveland, R. Harrison
• Democrats push low tariffs, Republicans push high
  tariffs, pensions for union veterans.
• Harrison wins but not by majority of popular vote
• not a strong President but an important
  administration

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Harrison Reforms

• Sherman Silver Purchase Act 1890 free
  unlimited coinage of silver
• inflates currency aids farmers
• McKinley Tariff passed in cooperation with
  Sherman Act, raised tariff rates to protect
  Northern business

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Reforms Continued

• Sherman Anti-Trust Act protect farmers small
  business from trusts
• insure no monopolies and restrict trade
• law was too vague and no penalties for breaking
  law

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Restricting Big Business

• Many states passed laws restricting mergers
• Congress passes Sherman Anti-trust Act in 1890 to
  protect from monopolies and restriction of trade
• Did little to curb big business
• Was however used to restrict labor

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Homestead Strike

• (Pennsylvania, 1892) at Carnegies steel plant
• Plant cuts pay to weaken union, hires
  scabs(people who cross picket lines
• Bloody confrontation between strikers hired
  scabs
• Plant remains open with non-union workers

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Election of 1892

• Harrison-R vs. Cleveland-D as well as Populist
  James Weaver
• Cleveland wins making him the only President to
  serve two non-consecutive terms
• Populist receive 22 electoral votes and will win
  many statewide elections and congress seats

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Cleveland term 2

• Panic of 1893 caused by inflation, labor
  agriculture. Problems, over speculating stocks
  causes worst economic depression ever
• tries to repeal Sherman Silver Act sends in
  troops to end Pullman strike, angers labor
• tries to pass Income Tax, unconstitutional
  according to courts
• sets up heated election of 1896

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Pullman Workers Strike

• employees strike in 1894 because of cut wages
• RR workers union refuses to handle Pullman cars
  so rail traffic is paralyzed
• Pullman files injunction to stop strike
• Union leader Eugene Debs jailed refusing to stop
• Pres. Cleveland uses federal troops to end strike

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Attempt to make the government respond to farmer
demands
POPULISM

• Farmers deep in debt, prices falling because of
  larger crops
• high costs of shipping, storage, and interest
  caused farmers to lose their land
• droughts, floods, insects did not help

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Farmer Organizations

• Grange First farm organization, worked in local
  and state politics to help farmers, eventually
  fails
• 3 separate organizations Southern Alliance,
  National Colored Alliance, Northern Alliance form
  the Farmers Alliance
• they join with labor representatives in 1892 to
  form the Populist Party

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Populist Platform

• Inflationary policy unlimited silver coinage
• graduated income tax
• 8 hour work day
• govt. owned RR, telegram, telephone
• immigrant restrictions

• Political reforms
• secret ballots
• initiative
• referendum
• recall
• direct election of US senators
• equal rights for all special privileges for
  none

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Election of 1896

• Populist Democrats nominate William Jennings
  Bryan
• Republicans nominate William McKinley
• Bryan gives famous cross of gold speech
• McKinley wins because of labor votes

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Industrial Revolution

• Inventions fuel new industries and communication
• Industries create wealth and a working class
• Unions form to protect the worker
• Immigrants fuel growth of nation

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The Inventors and their Inventions
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Thomas Edison

• More than 1,000 patents
• Created light bulb, phonograph, projector,
  storage battery, and telephone transmitter
• nations first industrial research lab
• first electric power plant in NYC

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Inventions and Inventors

• Telegraph-invented by Samuel Morse 1844
• 1860 lines cross US 1866 US connects to Europe
• Telephone-Alexander Graham Bell 1876
• Between 1860 1890 US govt. grants 400,000
  patents
• Many for business (typewriter) some for luxury
  (Eastman's camera)

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Henry Ford

• First to mass produce an automobile
• first car was the model T
• Cars were more affordable because of a process
  called the assembly line

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Wright Brothers

• First successful flight
• plane had 12hp motor
• flew 120 feet
• Orville piloted, Wilbur watched
• Flew at Kitty hawk, NC

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Captains of Industry
The Robber Barons
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Railroads lead the way in industry

• by 1900 there are five transcontinental lines
• large RRs are consolidating smaller RRs
• Cornelius Vanderbilt one of the RR barons, owns
  lines from NYC to the Great Lakes

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RR Growth

• Iron and steel needed for track and locomotives
  Lumber for rails, coal for fuel
• Industry must grow to meet these demands
• RRs change to a standard gauge track all lines
  use the same rails faster shipping

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RR Improvements

• Air brakes, refrigerated cars, Pullmans sleeper
  cars along with dining cars make RR better
• RRs compete using rebates to keep and attract
  customers
• Some RRs form pools agreements of no
  competition allowing them to set higher prices

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Steel Industry

• Large mills open in Pittsburgh, PN (steel
  capital)
• Andrew Carnegie opens his first mill here
• vertical integration bought mines, ships,
  warehouses, and RRs
• Sold out to J.P. Morgan creates first billion
  corporation

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John Rockefeller

• creates a refinery for oil in Cleveland, OH
• Standard Oil begins buying out other refineries
• low prices, customer pressure, RR rebates to
  destroy competition
• creates 1st trust
• has a monopoly on oil in the USA

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J.P. Morgan

• Owned largest banking chain in US
• Grew wealthy through investment
• Purchased many industries using strength and
  financial backing of his bank

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Growing Corporations

• Corporations begin to merge
• economic power controlled by few corporations
• 1900 one-third of ALL manufacturing controlled by
  1 of countrys corporations
• many states encouraged the practice

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Labor
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Industrial Workers

• Work 10-12 hours a day, 6 days a week
• Fired at any time no notice.
• Noisy, unsafe conditions many accidents
• Mines caved-in, garment workers toiled in
  sweatshops
• 1 million women worked in industry by 1900,
  received less pay

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Child Labor

• Children worked in mines factories as well as
  farms
• First child labor law said no child under 12
  kids could only work 10 hours per day.
• Widely ignored law especially on farms

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Industrial Workers

• Work 10-12 hours a day, 6 days a week
• Fired at any time no notice.
• Noisy, unsafe conditions many accidents
• Mines caved-in, garment workers toiled in
  sweatshops
• 1 million women worked in industry by 1900,
  received less pay

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Unions form from angry workers

• Knights of Labor founded by garment workers in
  Philly met secretly.
• Became a national society in 1880 included
  women, African Americans, immigrants
• Strikes and poor public opinion in 1890s ended
  its power

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American Federation of Labor (AFL) 1886

• Represented skilled labor led by Samuel Gompers
• pressed for higher wages, shorter hours, and
  better working conditions.
• wanted union to represent worker in meeting with
  management (collective bargaining)
• AFL survives strikes and by 1904 they have 1.6
  million members.

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Wobblies

• Chicago 1905 by 43 groups who left AFL
• International Workers of the World formed
• Includes unskilled laborers
• Radical union included Socialists

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Union Action through strikes!

• RR strike of 1877 happens when wages cut
• Workers destroy rail yards, track
• Strikebreakers hired to replace workers
• Federal troops must restore order

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Trouble in Chicago

• Haymarket Riot
• Workers from McCormick Harvester are members of
  Knights of Labor
• Wages cut so they go on strike
• Workers police clash 11 killed
• Public turns against Knights

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Challenge of Cities

• Two movement patterns
• Rural to urban (migration)
• Immigration to the United States
• Reasons cities grew
• Transportation-trains, trolleys, subways made
  travel from the suburbs possible.
• The invention of the steel girder(Bessemer
  process) made skyscrapers possible(extended
  cities up)

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• When the upper class moved to suburbs their
  houses were made into multifamily dwellings.
• Banks, businesses and government offices were
  located in central places within cities.
• Living conditions for city dwellers
• Open sewers, rats and crowding caused diseases to
  travel quickly

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• Tenements were cheaply built and so close
  together that fires spread quickly. (slums)
• Ghettos formed for two reasons because of
  persecution and because of similarities in
  culture
• Rapid urban growth put pressure on city officials
  to make improvements on city services (police,
  fire, transportation, etc.)

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UPPER CLASS

• The upper class had made their money in the new
  industries or by investing in new inventions.
  They were known as noveau rich and spent their
  money so that everyone would know exactly how
  rich they were. They also gave their money to
  charity(philanthropy). Culturally, they followed
  strict Victorian society (behavior).

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MIDDLE CLASS

• The growth of new industries created more jobs
  for educated workers. They also were concerned
  with social behavior as well and some became
  reformers that led the Progressive movement.

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POOR CLASS

• Mostly made of farmers/immigrants that lived in
  tenements that were poorly built. Often faced
  widespread discrimination and low pay. Mostly
  lived in parts of the city where other members of
  their culture lived.

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LITTLE ITALY, NEW YORK
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Jane Addams/Hull House

• Some reformers used the homes left by the wealthy
  to make multifamily dwellings. These were used
  as settlement homes for the new immigrants. They
  taught them English offered a daycare system and
  eventually added a kindergarten to help
  immigrants with language/skills. She won the
  Nobel Peace Prize for her work.

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REFORM MOVEMENTS

• Prohibition-was a ban on the manufacture and sale
  of alcoholic beverages.
• Purity Crusaders-wanted to rid the communities of
  unwholesome and illegal activities. (Drugs,
  gambling, prostitution and the political machine)
• Charity Organization Movement-wanted immigrants
  to adopt American culture and customs.

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More Reforms

• The Social Gospel Movement-sought to apply the
  teachings of Jesus directly to society focused on
  charity, justice, and labor reforms.
• The Salvation Army-Settlement houses and Red
  Cross provided social services to communities.
  This was the most successful.